ESPE Abstracts

Background: The negative effect of military conflicts on the health of the child population is a proven fact. The consequences of modern military conflicts for the physical development of children are practically not studied.

The aim: Of the study is to assess the nature of the physical development of children affected by the military conflict in the East of Ukraine.

Materials and methods: At the 179 girls and 128 boys aged 6–18 years who were in the zone of armed conflict in the East of Ukraine and applied for medical assistance in the SI «Institute for Children and Adolescents Health Care of the NAMS of Ukraine» in 2015–2017 studied the nature of physical development. Mathematical processing of the results obtained was carried out using the SPSS Statistics 17,0 and Excel software packages.

Results: Disharmonic physical development was defined by 41.0% of children (46.0% of boys and 37.3% of girls). Overweight was detected in 23.0% of children, high growth in 10.0%, low growth and insufficient body weight was detected at a frequency of 7.0%. A relationship between the nature of physical development, the sex of the child and his age at the time of the outbreak of hostilities in the East of Ukraine (April 2014) is established. Violation of physical development was most often determined in children whose age in 2014 was less than 7 years (66.7%). Among boys more often detected a low growth, among girls - overweight. In boys, who were 9–10 years old in 2014, on the contrary, twice the age of girls of the same age, excess body weight was determined (42.9% and 27.6%, respectively). It was in this age group in the dynamics of observation more often diagnosed severe form of obesity. It should be noted that overweight was the most common form of physical development disorder in adolescents of both sexes. Deficiency of body weight was detected much less often, mainly in boys, who in 2014 were 11–13 years old (14.6%).

Conclusions: Young children and adolescents at the beginning of puberty, who at this time were in the zone of military conflict in the East of Ukraine, are at risk of developing physical development disorders. In the structure of disharmonious physical development excessive body weight prevails.

Keywords: children, adolescents, physical development, military conflicts.